Second Chances
by TardisBlueMermaid
Summary: A continuation of the epilogue of "Checklist" where Philip finds Sofie after her exile. Both are in need of a second chance.


**A/N: I thought about adding this piece at the end of **_**Checklist**_ **since it starts right where it leaves off, but it seemed kind of unnecessary, so I never wrote it. Then, I was in the mood to write something, but lately, I've had no ideas to write. This short continuation of Philip and Sofie was the only idea I had so here it is, as unnecessary as it is.**

**Also, just an FYI that **_**Discoveries of a Little Mermaid**_ **was NOT updated on July 29th. I deleted a chapter from it which apparently counts as an "update". So, if anything, there's less to read. Sorry for any confusion.**

* * *

**Second Chances**

_Philip_. He had become the light in her life over the past months. He was not the king. He was not the sword with blue gems. His kindness and sympathy was the light keeping her alive in such a dark life.

But then Sofie remembered. Philip was _not _her light. He had betrayed her.

Sofie turned her head away from him. Philip was kneeling too close to her. Her visions always seemed too close to her. She shut her eyes tight and reopened them, hoping to see him gone, but he remained in front of her.

"Sofie…It's me."

"Go away!" she screamed, forcefully pushing Philip away from her.

He reacted with a painful grunt, but didn't leave her side. Growing anxious and scared, Sofie felt her heart beating harder than she ever felt it beat before, and she couldn't control her breathing. She moved away from her former friend, crawling backwards until she had enough room to stand and run away.

He was not her light. If anything, he was here to hurt her.

And as soon as she stood up, Sofie's knees wobbled, and she felt the world grow dark.

* * *

Philip rubbed the part of his chest where Sofie had practically punched him as he watched her back away from him, but, as soon as she rose, she fell back to the ground. Thankfully, Philip had stood with her and was there to catch her. He looked down and found Sofie unconscious in his arms.

She was cold and soaking wet due to the downpour that had just ended, turning into just drops from the sky. The hood shielding her face had fallen off her head. Philip moved her hair out of her face and planted a small kiss on her forehead. His lips were met with burning skin. A hand immediately moved to her forehead to confirm a fever. How many nights had she spent out in the rain and cold?

He scooped her up and began walking out of the alley. With the worst of the rain over, people began heading back out into the streets. Philip tried asking the Norwegain passersby the direction of a doctor who could help Sofie, but many ignored him, not interested in understanding his Danish accent. He then asked an elderly woman, who saw Sofie limp in his arms. She gently touched her forehead, offering a sad look, before pointing out a building down the street.

Philip thanked her and headed towards the building. When he arrived, he shifted Sofie in his arms to knock on the door. She stirred in his arms and murmured something he couldn't understand, but she remained unconscious.

A nurse answered the door. Upon seeing Sofie she exclaimed, "Oh, dear! Come in. Come in." She held the door open for him as he stepped in. "What happened?"

The nurse called for the doctor while gesturing to a room. Philip answered as they walked in, "I found her out in the rain. She has a fever. She must be sick."

He gently put her down on the bed and delicately brushed the hair out of her face. Philip looked up to see the doctor, an older man with a short, white beard, standing in the doorway.

"You go tell the doctor what happened," the nurse ordered. "I'll get her out of these wet clothes."

Philip nodded, then followed the doctor out of the room and closed the door behind him. The doctor held out a hand and introduced himself. "Dr. Andersen."

Philip shook his hand. "Philip Frandsen."

"And what is the name of the young lady?"

Philip thought for a moment. Surely news had traveled of the girl who tried to assassinate a royal. Sofie's name could be just as well known here as it was in Denmark.

Hastily, Philip settled on a new first name. She'd have to be happy with it for the time being. "Elin."

"And what happened? Getting caught in just one downpour couldn't have done this to her."

"I broke her heart a few weeks ago," Philip confessed, as best he could. He couldn't tell the doctor the true story. Sofie was a criminal and was supposed to be dead, afterall. He continued with the vague but partially true details. "Her situation was also pretty rough, so she left home. She left in such haste I guess when she got here she didn't know what to do or where to go. She must have spent quite a few cold nights outside."

The doctor nodded understandably, not pressing on with further questions. "It's a good thing you came looking for her, lad. We'll take care of her. Don't worry."

* * *

_Sofie missed no one more than her father. Out in the cold, dark streets of this unknown place, he was who she longed for most._

_Strangely, she found herself walking down an endless street, shivering in the cold as she passed by the tall, dark, and empty buildings. Sofie then felt the air getting warmer. It felt pleasant, at first, but she soon realized it only continued to get hotter. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead as she grew overheated._

_Still, Sofie continued on absentmindedly, feeling almost no control over her body. At last, she came to a street corner, but it did not lead to another street. Instead, the scene in front of her was of her old village._

_A hot fire blazed across it, burning houses and memories. It was the same sight from her childhood. Staining the dirt with blood were countless bodies laying across the ground, unable to move away from the flames. An unpleasant smell of death hung in the air._

_She heard a familiar groan. Frantically, Sofie search amongst the bodies, looking for the one who made the noise. The young woman saw him move. Despite fear, she ran over to him. As she thought, it was her father, covered in blood which only continued to pour profusely from his stomach wound at an alarming, almost impossible, rate. _

"_Papa, you'll be okay," she said, kneeling next to him, but something rang in her head; it was too late. He was dead. Long since dead._

"_Sofie…" he started to reply but was silenced as he began coughing up blood._

_She looked to her right. The fire drew closer to them. Sweat run down her forehead._

"_Papa!" she urged him to get up._

"Her father's been dead for years," she heard a new voice say from nowhere. It was Philip's, but she couldn't see him. The fire halted.

_Yes, Philip, she thought as she stared at her father's lifeless body. I know he's been dead for years. Just because I told you about his death, doesn't mean you get to rub it in._

"It's the fever talking," she heard an older man say.

_That reminded her of the orphanage._

_During one of her winters spent there, Sofie had fallen ill. It was nearly two years after the massacre, and she was still young. She remembered the fever taking over her small body; it was like she was on fire. _

_Why was she able to feel it again?_

_Her illness was so bad that the women of the orphanage had to bring a doctor to look at Sofie, but he couldn't do much other than to diagnose her and give advice as to how to control the fever and try to keep her alive._

_Eventually, Sofie began to show signs of improvement. She was able to regain consciousness, but she was left too weak to get out of bed. For days all she did was lay in bed and listen to the rumors started by the other children. They were scared of her._

"_I'm not going anywhere near her. I don't want to get sick."_

"_Yeah. Mary said she has some weird disease."_

"_I heard she caught the plague and is planning on infecting all of us with it because she hates us."_

_The children gasped dramatically then laughed harder than necessary before Sofie heard them scurry away. She would have cried if she had the strength._

_Sofie could still hear the laughter repeating in her head. It increased in volume, and as it did so, she fire taking over her body grew stronger. Sofie found herself too tired to think, let alone recall such a difficult memory._

_But it seemed her mind would never give her a rest. It never did. She could see the fire again. It engulfed her village as she looked back at it one last time before the king's guards, with their cocky grins and fancy uniforms, came out of the smoke and forcefully took her away. She missed her home. She missed having a home._

_Stopping, Sofie looked down at the ground. A familiar, evil sword laid in front of her. No one wielded it. She felt the rough tug of the guard pulling on her arm. Sofie looked up at his face. He smiled as if he was enjoying murder. He was a nasty man. Looking back down at the sword, she found shoes in its place instead. Sofie's eyes trailed up from the shoes to the person's face; it was King Eric, now wielding the sword in his hands._

"_I'll have to use this when I come looking for you, for real, of course," he said inspecting the sword's blade._

"_No!" the young woman exclaimed, frantically shaking her head. That was not how she wanted to die, not by the weapon and blood she spent her life running from. "I won't cause any more trouble. I'll be gone soon. Just let me die in peace."_

_He shook his head as if chastising a young child. "You know you I can't leave you freely roaming the streets after all you've done. Although, your fears are entertaining. Now that I think about it, my wife would have actually been doing you a favor by letting you die."_

_He was right. This second chance given to her by the queen was terrible. Sofie had spent countless nights on the streets, fearing him and his guards would come looking for her. She swore she saw them one or twice before, but she would later realize the next day she couldn't have; they would have killed her already. Some nights, she found herself disappointed they didn't._

_Suddenly, she no longer saw the king or her old village. She felt someone squeeze her hand._

"I'm sorry this all happened to you," Sofie heard Philip say.

_She tried to get his voice out of her head. She hated Philip. He had betrayed her. When she first saw him standing above her on the streets, she grew excited. He was not in his guards uniform. On numerous occasions, Sofie guiltily found herself dreaming that Philip would come looking for her, not as a guard fulfilling his duty to his king, but as the friend he claimed he was to Sofie, only wishing to make sure she was okay._

_But then she would remember how Philip had betrayed her, and Sofie no longer wished to see him._

_Besides, he would never come looking for her…_

"I hope you'll forgive me," she heard Philip again, this time accompanied by a squeeze of her hand. Its warmth felt so real it finally caused her to open her eyes. She was confused and unaware she had been sleeping, but Sofie realized she was now in a dry nightgown and inside a warm room. It was a small, plain room. Across from the bed she had just realized she was laying in, was the door left open ajar.

She felt a squeeze again. "Sofie?" she heard from her right.

Sofie looked towards the voice. Her eyes, still used to the darkness, squinted when met with the sunlight entering through the window. Only a dark figure sitting beside the bed could be made out, but quickly, Sofie's eyes adjusted after blinking a few times to reveal Philip. Wide-eyed, she pulled her hand back from him, but she could still feel the touch of his hand on hers. It felt so _real_. Sofie didn't know what to say or do, other than to stare at him in disbelief as she tried to collect herself.

"I'm not going to hurt you," Philip gently said, knowing her concerns, and leaned back in his chair, holding his hands out in front of him, to show he had no weapons.

Sofie shook her head. That wasn't the real Philip. She closed her eyes tight and reopened them, hoping to see this vision gone. He was still there. She tried this two more times, but yet, he would not leave her side.

"Go away!" she ordered. Sometimes her visions were so vivid and determined to stay, no matter how much she wished them gone. "I know you aren't real. You _can't_ be."

Philip shook his head. "Sofie, I _am_ real."

"That's what they _all_ say."

Sofie was then startled when another figure walked into the room. She had never seen this woman before.

The woman—she looked like a nurse—smiled. "Oh, good. You're awake. The doctor's out on a house call right now, but he'll be back shortly. I'll get some soup heated up for you. I trust Philip will explain things to you."

The nurse walked out of the room, and Sofie slowly turned her attention back to Philip as she processed who she had acknowledged: _Philip_.

"She sees me," he pointed with his thumb towards the door. "You're not the only one, Sofie. I _am _real."

"Are you here to arrest me?" Sofie asked. It was what she wondered most. Like in the streets, he was not in his guards uniform, but she unsure if that meant he was off duty or not. He could be undercover.

Philip shook his head with a soft smile. She had caused so much chaos back home, but here she seemed so innocent. "No, Sofie. I am not here to arrest you, or to hurt you. I wanted to find you to make sure you were okay."

"But how did you know I was alive? The queen was supposed to inform everyone I died?" Sofie wondered, shakily sitting up in bed with the strength she could muster. Her body felt so weak.

"She did, but she told me the truth. I know how she helped you escape the country. She told me where I might find you, and I'm glad I came searching for you," he paused to recall when he found her. "You were out in the rain when I came across you in the alley. No sooner did you stand up than you lost consciousness. You were burning up with a bad fever. I brought you to a doctor. I couldn't leave you for dead out there on the streets."

Sofie scoffed at how he spoke as if her was her hero. "Well, I don't know why you bothered saving me. You certainly didn't care about me back at the castle. You would have killed the king if you didn't want me dead!"

"Be quiet," Philip hushed. He glanced towards the door, and then in a low, serious voice he warned, "Do you want everyone to know you are the lady's maid who tried to kill her king? Now, listen. If I wanted you dead, I wouldn't have sent you the letter warning you to get out."

Sofie vigorously shook her head, ready to argue his letter. "I know you think that letter was a compromise, but it still favored one side. It protected the king perfectly, not me at all. No, if I hadn't escaped in time, I would have been arrested and killed. The queen even had an opportunity to kill me. With all the variables, it was a slim chance I made it out alive," Sofie explained.

"But you _did_ have enough time to escape, and the queen _didn't_ kill you herself. Instead you got the opportunity to have a second chance like I planned for you."

"Ha!" Sofie laughed. She gestured around her. "What kind of a second chance is this? I've been suffering in the streets as I wait for my death!"

"That's why I came looking for you. I want to help you get back on your feet so you aren't suffering anymore," he said, pausing to see if Sofie had anything to say in return. When she said nothing, Philip continued with the following, "But I think you should know that you were very reckless with that letter yourself."

Sofie looked at him curiously.

"You just threw my note on the floor of the royal bedroom for anyone to find. I'm lucky the queen found it and not the king, or else I would have been dismissed for assisting you, if not arrested myself."

Sofie thought back to that moment. She recalled crumbling up the sheet of paper only to throw it on the floor. "I'm sorry," she sheepishly apologized before asking another curious question. "What did the queen do about it?"

"Well, she said she would keep it between us if I didn't tell anyone she helped you flee the country," he explained.

"Do you really trust her, though?" Sofie questioned, raising an eyebrow. "She's still the one with all the power."

Philip shrugged. "I'm not too worried. I think the queen knows better than to say anything. I like to think I put her in her place during our conversation."

"_You_ put her in her place?"

"Yep," Philip smiled proudly. He had been wanting to tell Sofie about their conversation. "Told her how she was a terrible friend to you. I told her that if she were really your friend she would have understood you."

Sofie laughed. "You didn't." She paused to watch Philip nod his head proudly, and she laughed harder.

"You should have seen the look on her face. She didn't want to believe what I was saying."

Sofie released the tension in her shoulders as she relaxed a bit, growing more comfortable around Philip again, like she was before his betrayal. She confided, "I'm glad to be away from her, and the king even more."

"I think it will do you good to be away from everyone. We'll have a good fresh start out here."

"We?"

Philip shrugged shyly. Embarrassingly, he felt his face turn slightly pink at the phrase. "Yeah. We."

"Don't you plan on going home now that you've seen I'm okay?" Sofie assumed.

"What I saw was you roaming the streets, alone and scared. That's not okay, and if I leave you, you'll go back to doing just that."

She protested, "I won't."

"You won't? Then what will you do?"

"I-I don't know…" she expressed. She closed her eyes to fight back the tears, but it didn't work. Instead she frustratingly reverted to trying to wipe the tears away before they fell far down her cheeks. "I don't know what to do, Philip. I don't really want to do anything anymore."

Cautiously, unsure of how her emotions might change, Philip leaned forward and grabbed her hand in his. "I think you want me to stay with you."

She rolled her eyes and annoyingly shook her head, denying it. "I really don't."

"Well, I do."

"Don't you want to go back to the castle? You said you loved being a royal guard. You can't stay here," She looked down at her hand, still in his. She wondered why she hadn't pulled away yet.

He shook his head. "Funny story about that. They offered me a promotion for revealing your intentions, but I couldn't accept it, not with knowing what I did to you. I completely resigned actually, so don't make me go back looking like a fool."

"You resigned from the job you loved to find me, even though you didn't know exactly where I was or if I was even still alive?"

"It was a risk I was willing to take," Philip stated. He meant it, too. The former guard knew that, despite everything she may have done, he would have given up anything for Sofie, just to help her get a second chance at life. And maybe, this would give _him_ a second chance of being with her.

Sofie offered him a small smile in return as she ran thoughts through her head. It took some time for her to think straight. She found her head still clouded by fatigue, anger for Philip, and by the dream-that's what it must have all been while she fought the fever.

At first, she came to the conclusion he was trying to guilt her into accepting his help, but then she realized, he had literally given up his home and life for her. It would be horrible of her to send him away or to run away from him, as she had begun to think of doing.

She didn't like being horrible. _Perhaps_ she liked being horrible towards the king and his wife and everyone who had hurt her, but not towards Philip.

It seemed he truly did care about her.

And Sofie _did_ want to feel safe and warm again. Philip could give her that.

A silence hovered over the two as she thought. Her attention was drawn back to her hand in his. As he waited, Philip had begun rubbing his thumb across her knuckles. She wasn't sure if he was aware he was doing it, but she suddenly didn't care about his touch. The warmth of his hand felt good.

For the first time in what felt like forever, a wave of hope washed over her. Philip could help her, and he really wanted to. Most importantly, he truly understood. He was her light, a _friend_, during the darkest times at the castle. She never had someone like that before. She was so upset at Philip for taking that away with his betrayal, but he was offering it again, and all she had to do was give him a second chance.

Like he had done for her.

Philip watched as a tear rolled down Sofie's cheek. He was afraid she had begun to feel worse. He let go of her hand to wipe the tear away. His hand then paused to cup her cheek.

Sofie smile, placing a hand over his to keep it there. "I don't deserve you. Not with everything I've done."

"You do," he objected. "So, will you let me stay by your side?"

She nodded, "Yeah. I'd like that."

Philip leaned forward and planted a kiss on her forehead. It would be a job with plenty of ups and downs, and he wasn't even sure how to go about it, but he would do it. "We'll get you back on your feet in no time."

* * *

"Your Majesty, a letter."

Ariel rose from her seat and took the letter. "Thank you, Jacob."

The messenger boy nodded and left, leaving Ariel alone to read her letter. She recognised who the letter was from. She hadn't heard anything from him since he left the castle almost a year ago. Eagerly, unsure of whether the news was good or bad news and wishing to know, she opened the letter and read:

_Your Majesty,  
__Due to our privacy concerns, I think you will agree with me when I request you burn this letter as soon as you read it. I wish to inform you that I have found what I was searching for in Norway. In an alley way I found a girl who was lonely, ill, and scared. After much persuasion, she accepted my help, and I believe she is doing better than she's done in years. Furthermore, I am excited to announce that we will wed in the near future. We thank you for the information you gave me and therefore the second chance you have given us both.  
__Sincerely,  
__Philip Frandsen_

Ariel smiled. She was still had conflicting thoughts of Sofie, but she was glad to hear Philip got her under control, hopefully preventing her from hurting anyone again. As long as Sofie was under his supervision and working to be a better person, as Ariel knew Philip would encourage, it was fine. And, she was glad Philip seemed happy.

She folded the letter up and walked over to the fire place, already lit. Reading it one last time, she tossed it into the flames. She agreed this had to stay a secret if they were to keep their second chance.

"What was that?" she heard someone from behind her ask.

She turned around to find Eric. Ariel told him, with a shrug and a smile, "Oh, just some old scrap paper. _Nothing_ to worry about."


End file.
